Folsom Painting

While others have had positive experiences with this company, my experience has not been a good one. I'm chalking up to lessons learned yet am posting this so people are aware of this experience and in the hopes that others may benefit from my mistakes when hiring a contractor, in general.

5 years ago, in escrow buying my home, I learned that to secure my FHA funding that I had to paint my house to remediate lead paint before I even signed the papers. Got 3 estimates, Folsom Painting was the middle estimate, and one was ~$1-1.5k more (from Cress, well-known in Midtown at the time). I hired F.P. The job they were hired for was to take care of the lead paint, and this was clearly communicated to all 3 painters in the same manner. Cress' estimate provides good evidence that this expectation was clearly conveyed.

Year 1, I notice some paint lifting. Within 2, it was much worse and has gotten progressively worse since (see pictures of yellow house on Yelp). I called F.P. once about 3 years after the job was done, because it was getting so bad, and I was told that this is normal. I should not have taken this as an ok response (lesson!). I should have trusted myself!

After the heavy rains a few weeks ago, I see paint ballooning out, holding water. This concerned me, so with the paint being so bad, I decide to look into re-siding. Enter two siding contractors who came to give me estimates that were shocked to see a 5 year old paint job looking this bad. One informed me that I could report them to the contractors license board because it's so bad (lesson-you have 4 yrs to do so!). Siders also tell me I'll have to do hazmat removal because the amount of peeling lead paint (yesterday, I learn the cost for this is just over $4k!).

I emailed Folsom Painting on 2/16 to have them come see the condition of the house. Email gets ignored, so I call Daniel and he acknowledges he got the email (this is handy for later on). He comes out on 2/21 and his approach is, again, like the condition of the paint is something I should have expected (I was never told the paint job would only last me a handful of years or to expect it to peel like it is!). Daniel said he remembered this job really well because HE did the work. But, he said his dad owned the company at the time but that he would "make right" on his dad's project (admission that something went wrong with this project!). Daniel offers to paint the house again (I felt this was cool). I told him about the lead paint hazard and its implications with the siding and he asks what I want. I said I didn't know, because I still had to weigh all of my options. I also let him know that I was having an unbiased painter come look at the house, to be fair to all involved, so I could get their impression. However, I did ask Daniel if he'd consider a partial refund and he said no (hmmm).

I met with the other painter and his impression was that I essentially got what I paid for but not what this job was intended to be, nor what was asked for, which was lead paint removal as a contingency of my home loan. My interaction with Daniel was cordial when he came out, but still very tense. I decide, after considering all things, that a very fair resolution, and the least stressful to both of us, is a partial refund in the amount $1,000. I arrived at this amount factoring what it would roughly cost him, without profit mark-up, to repaint the house, as offered. I used a middle of the road labor rate of $20 using the following source (http://www.dc16iupat.org/ULWSiteResources/iupatdc16/Resources/file/Wage%20Sched...⇄ He said it took him a week to prep alone last time, so I used 40 hours to prep and paint this time. I included $200 in materials for 5 gallons of Sherwin Williams A100 exterior paint @ $42.49/gallon ($212) with a 15% contractors discount (reduces paint cost to ~$180) and ~$20 for incidental materials. Note, this estimate doesn't even include all the extras he'd need to do to contain the lead paint scraping that current standards call for. So, an extremely fair estimate!!! My hope was that after some thought, he'd see this as the path of least resistance and a smart business move.

Emailed Daniel on 2/24/15 presenting this option. He ignored this email. 24 hours later I followed up, kindly asking for a response. Nothing. WOW!

Cress Painting warned me that if another contractor said they could do the job for less that I wouldn't be getting the job done right. Because the other two bids were lower, I assumed Cress was price gouging me and using scare tactics, but they were right. Lesson-I should have gotten an itemized estimate with lead paint removal intent clearly stated and with documented warranty info. If I had that, we'd be in small claims court right now.

Folsom Painting-a "family owned" business since 1990. You can't rest on the laurels of a company name only to use your dad owning it in the past as a cop-out when suited!

Daniel is the most professional and detail oriented contractor I've ever hired. I would recommend him to family and friends in a heart beat. Cannot say enough good things about his paint quality or business practices. I feel fortunate to have found him!